Environment

Reducing aircraft soot emissions may not reduce contrail clouds, according to in-flight observations of emissions from a passenger jet with modern “lean-burn” engines, reported in Nature. Contrails from aircraft contribute to the climate-warming impacts of […]

A growing network of meltwater lakes at the edge of the Greenland ice sheet is accelerating the flow of major glaciers, potentially increasing the pace of global sea-level rise. Warmer air and sea temperatures have […]

Rivers are rarely the calm, orderly streams we imagine on maps. Over time, their winding paths—called meanders—shift, bend, and occasionally snap off in sudden “cutoff” events that shorten loops and reshape the landscape. While scientists […]

Emissions of two major pollutants have steadily decreased on Salt Lake City roads over the past two decades, while levels of carbon dioxide emissions, a related gas blamed for climate change, remained steady, according to […]

Researchers have uncovered new evidence that short-lived spikes in ocean phosphorus may have played a major role in two of the most severe marine extinctions in Earth’s history. Dr. Matthew Dodd from The University of […]

The Syrian civil war, which began in 2011, caused widespread population displacement and infrastructure damage. However, it has also led to an unintended environmental effect with notable changes in the country’s landscape, according to a […]

When pollution gets bad enough in the rivers supplying Iowa’s largest city with drinking water, it costs Des Moines around $16,000 a day to run a special system to filter out dangerous nitrates. It’s a […]

In a first-of-its-kind study, a team of researchers led by geoscientist Michael Rawlins at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has shown in fine-grained detail what happens when Arctic permafrost thaws. Focusing on a Wisconsin-sized area […]

A new research review published in npj Climate Action counters a recently proposed idea published in Nature Climate Change that ecotourism could serve as a mechanism to decarbonize the tourism industry.This post was originally published […]

More than 2 trillion gallons of water—enough to fill 3 million Olympic-sized swimming pools—inundated Hawaiʻi in March. The accumulated rainfall over 14 days reached as high as 3,000% of normal historical levels for this time […]